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Sep. 4th, 2020 06:19 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
babydracoRemember that How I Met Your Mother scene where Barney reveals that he assumed Johnny from Cobra Kai was the hero of The Karate Kid?
And what if Netflix made a show that has a sympathetic redemption arc for him? Johnny from Cobra Kai, not Barney Stinson.
Lots of spoilers, and long story short, I really like it.
"Karate in the Valley is like football in Texas", Amanda, Daniel La Russo's wife opines.
It's been 30 years (as of 2018) and Daniel La Russo owns a chain of successful car dealerships and is happily married with two kids in Encino. Johnny is estranged from his ex and son, living in a sad studio apartment in Receda, eating beef jerky for breakfast and buying his dinner at the mini mart. It's like he's been in a fog for years. He doesn't know how to use a smart phone or set up wifi, he spends a lot of time watching old action movies, and he claims "there are no women in karate, it's like the Army" (women have been in the Army since WWII...) He reminds me a little of Dean Winchester, a man whose ideas of what's cool and manly were frozen at the age of 15 and heavily influenced by bad 80s action tv and his abusive father figure's taste.
He decides to reopen Cobra Kai after fighting off a group of boys bullying a kid (Miguel) at the mini mart. He's a little out of shape, but he's a former karate champion fighting a bunch of kids who don't know karate at all, so... he gets arrested for that.
Johnny does get a really funny scene where he relates the events of the original movie from his perspective. We also learn that he grew up wealthy, but with an emotionally abusive stepdad, which really primed him for the psychological abuse of Kreese.
But in keeping with how our view of things change as we get older, there is no bad guy between our two protagonists. Johnny is no villain and Daniel is no saint. For example, his wife is aghast that Daniel convinced the owner of the strip mall where Cobra Kai is housed, to raise the rent.
"You mean all of this was so you could get revenge on your childhood karate rival?"
I mean, Daniel is still slightly more of a better person, having had a head start on that, but we can see Johnny is trying, he wants to do the right thing, he just doesn't have the same emotional tools to work with.
Meanwhile, Daniel has been teaching karate to and mentoring a boy who, unbeknownst to him, is Johnny's estranged son (Robby, who has a major Early 90s Teen Idol thing going on, I swear he's the ghost of Jonathan Brandis), and Johnny is teaching the new generation's version of Daniel (Miguel). Miguel, instead of being totally corrupted by Johnny and Cobra Kai, is often teaching *him* how to Adult Human Being. Daniel's daughter Sam is apparently about to find herself in the middle of a love triangle between the two teenage boys, but she's also a well defined character in her own right who has her own goals and storylines going on. Part of this is obviously the result of changing times and audience expectations, but also that it's a tv show and has at least 13 hours a year to explore anything they want.
It passes the Bechdel Test, which is something that the IMO unfairly maligned Next Karate Kid unfortunately failed to do when they had the chance.
Just like in the original movie, I feel like the teen heroes go from clumsy beginners to action heroes in the space of a few months and that doesn't feel realistic (except Sam, who has been studying off and on most of her life and has a dojo in her house).
But, the kids are supposed to be specially talented, their teachers are supposed to be the best around, champions taught by champions, and the kids spend what appears to be most of their free time training. It's a lifestyle, rather than the one or two classes a week most people would take. And the teaching styles used are designed to help you pick up as much as possible as quickly as possible- Miyagi Do teaches you muscle memory by having you perform seemingly unrelated tasks until the moves are like breathing, while Cobra Kai is basically "learn this now or you could die, you pathetic wuss". Miyagi Do starts your training by making you clean the dojo, Johnny took his Cobra students to the junkyard and set dogs on them.
They also have a fundamentally different philosophy of martial arts. Miyagi Do is about self defense and spirituality, while Cobra Kai is a...let's say...more Western approach, what non Asian people want to believe karate is going to be.
I'm not a practitioner of any martial art myself, but my dad and sister are black belts in kung fu (shaolin kenpo). But I've been doing yoga for years and I've noticed a similar divide.
There are a ton of people who are always in yoga class, it's a cliche at this point, who epitomize the opposite of everything you'd think yoga is about. You know, the rich lady with the fake tan in head to toe Lulu Lemon, barking into her phone during a class break, there because yoga is a status symbol. In an effort to convince potential Western practitioners that yoga isn't a scary cult or a threat to Christianity, most of the spiritual aspects have been quietly done away with in the last 40 years or so. I took a class right before the pandemic, and the teacher was really great and all but she said "Yoga is not a spiritual practice". And maybe she has to say that because it was at the City Community Center and you can't advocate a faith on government funded property? IDK. Anyway, it's billed as mostly just exercise.
"Demetri, you're the most neurotic person I know. You always expect the worst. Use that to your advantage".
It takes most people with high anxiety a lifetime, if they ever learn it, to realize that being scared means you're hyper aware and that being hyper aware can be a gift. A lot of kids who've been bullied might be good fighters if that was pointed out to them earlier, because being constantly bullied makes you hyper aware of the world around you.
Predictions for next season (which has been greenlit):
Miguel's father will figure in somehow. There have been two or three references so far to him being "dangerous" back in Mexico.
Kreese is the obvious S3 villain, as he wormed his way back into Johnny's life, got a job at the dojo and then stole Cobra Kai back from him while Johnny was out of town. Now he heads a rogue Cobra faction. Johnny and Daniel will have to team up against him.
Miguel will survive, but Robby will be prosecuted for throwing him off the mezzanine. Tory will be charged, Sam will either not be charged or will get off. Sam is the rich, well liked, good student and...Tory isn't. Tory is the one who burst into the main office, hijacked the microphone from the student reading the morning announcements and told the entire school over the intercom that she was coming to get Sam LaRusso. Witnesses saw her stalk Sam through the hallway, grab her by her backpack, saw two boys push Sam at her when Sam tried to get away, and everyone saw Tory throw the first punch. Probably a lot of witnesses to the fact that Tory later pulled out a weapon and Sam didn't.
Demetri might be prosecuted for throwing Hawk head first into a glass trophy case but since Hawk barely had a scratch on him after, and was up and walking around fine a few minutes later, that might not stick.
And the parents will sue the school for being warned about this and doing absolutely nothing about it. The student who started the riot openly warned them before she did it, they had at least like, a half hour to an hour to call the cops and get Sam to safety. LBR, if Tory was black she would have been punished just for storming in and grabbing the mic, if she was autistic she'd be locked in a closet just for "displaying a threatening attitude". The security guard they were in the process of interviewing for a job when the riot broke out was not only unqualified but an adult member of Cobra Kai (Chubs/Stingray) who immediately started defending Cobras against Miyagi Do kids. Some of the teachers ran away!
To be fair, it's a public school in the 21c, so the teachers were probably drilled on what to do in the event of an active shooter but not how to stop a full scale karate riot. These kids don't need guns, they've been taught how to kill with their bare hands and there were like fifteen of them.
And what if Netflix made a show that has a sympathetic redemption arc for him? Johnny from Cobra Kai, not Barney Stinson.
Lots of spoilers, and long story short, I really like it.
"Karate in the Valley is like football in Texas", Amanda, Daniel La Russo's wife opines.
It's been 30 years (as of 2018) and Daniel La Russo owns a chain of successful car dealerships and is happily married with two kids in Encino. Johnny is estranged from his ex and son, living in a sad studio apartment in Receda, eating beef jerky for breakfast and buying his dinner at the mini mart. It's like he's been in a fog for years. He doesn't know how to use a smart phone or set up wifi, he spends a lot of time watching old action movies, and he claims "there are no women in karate, it's like the Army" (women have been in the Army since WWII...) He reminds me a little of Dean Winchester, a man whose ideas of what's cool and manly were frozen at the age of 15 and heavily influenced by bad 80s action tv and his abusive father figure's taste.
He decides to reopen Cobra Kai after fighting off a group of boys bullying a kid (Miguel) at the mini mart. He's a little out of shape, but he's a former karate champion fighting a bunch of kids who don't know karate at all, so... he gets arrested for that.
Johnny does get a really funny scene where he relates the events of the original movie from his perspective. We also learn that he grew up wealthy, but with an emotionally abusive stepdad, which really primed him for the psychological abuse of Kreese.
But in keeping with how our view of things change as we get older, there is no bad guy between our two protagonists. Johnny is no villain and Daniel is no saint. For example, his wife is aghast that Daniel convinced the owner of the strip mall where Cobra Kai is housed, to raise the rent.
"You mean all of this was so you could get revenge on your childhood karate rival?"
I mean, Daniel is still slightly more of a better person, having had a head start on that, but we can see Johnny is trying, he wants to do the right thing, he just doesn't have the same emotional tools to work with.
Meanwhile, Daniel has been teaching karate to and mentoring a boy who, unbeknownst to him, is Johnny's estranged son (Robby, who has a major Early 90s Teen Idol thing going on, I swear he's the ghost of Jonathan Brandis), and Johnny is teaching the new generation's version of Daniel (Miguel). Miguel, instead of being totally corrupted by Johnny and Cobra Kai, is often teaching *him* how to Adult Human Being. Daniel's daughter Sam is apparently about to find herself in the middle of a love triangle between the two teenage boys, but she's also a well defined character in her own right who has her own goals and storylines going on. Part of this is obviously the result of changing times and audience expectations, but also that it's a tv show and has at least 13 hours a year to explore anything they want.
It passes the Bechdel Test, which is something that the IMO unfairly maligned Next Karate Kid unfortunately failed to do when they had the chance.
Just like in the original movie, I feel like the teen heroes go from clumsy beginners to action heroes in the space of a few months and that doesn't feel realistic (except Sam, who has been studying off and on most of her life and has a dojo in her house).
But, the kids are supposed to be specially talented, their teachers are supposed to be the best around, champions taught by champions, and the kids spend what appears to be most of their free time training. It's a lifestyle, rather than the one or two classes a week most people would take. And the teaching styles used are designed to help you pick up as much as possible as quickly as possible- Miyagi Do teaches you muscle memory by having you perform seemingly unrelated tasks until the moves are like breathing, while Cobra Kai is basically "learn this now or you could die, you pathetic wuss". Miyagi Do starts your training by making you clean the dojo, Johnny took his Cobra students to the junkyard and set dogs on them.
They also have a fundamentally different philosophy of martial arts. Miyagi Do is about self defense and spirituality, while Cobra Kai is a...let's say...more Western approach, what non Asian people want to believe karate is going to be.
I'm not a practitioner of any martial art myself, but my dad and sister are black belts in kung fu (shaolin kenpo). But I've been doing yoga for years and I've noticed a similar divide.
There are a ton of people who are always in yoga class, it's a cliche at this point, who epitomize the opposite of everything you'd think yoga is about. You know, the rich lady with the fake tan in head to toe Lulu Lemon, barking into her phone during a class break, there because yoga is a status symbol. In an effort to convince potential Western practitioners that yoga isn't a scary cult or a threat to Christianity, most of the spiritual aspects have been quietly done away with in the last 40 years or so. I took a class right before the pandemic, and the teacher was really great and all but she said "Yoga is not a spiritual practice". And maybe she has to say that because it was at the City Community Center and you can't advocate a faith on government funded property? IDK. Anyway, it's billed as mostly just exercise.
"Demetri, you're the most neurotic person I know. You always expect the worst. Use that to your advantage".
It takes most people with high anxiety a lifetime, if they ever learn it, to realize that being scared means you're hyper aware and that being hyper aware can be a gift. A lot of kids who've been bullied might be good fighters if that was pointed out to them earlier, because being constantly bullied makes you hyper aware of the world around you.
Predictions for next season (which has been greenlit):
Miguel's father will figure in somehow. There have been two or three references so far to him being "dangerous" back in Mexico.
Kreese is the obvious S3 villain, as he wormed his way back into Johnny's life, got a job at the dojo and then stole Cobra Kai back from him while Johnny was out of town. Now he heads a rogue Cobra faction. Johnny and Daniel will have to team up against him.
Miguel will survive, but Robby will be prosecuted for throwing him off the mezzanine. Tory will be charged, Sam will either not be charged or will get off. Sam is the rich, well liked, good student and...Tory isn't. Tory is the one who burst into the main office, hijacked the microphone from the student reading the morning announcements and told the entire school over the intercom that she was coming to get Sam LaRusso. Witnesses saw her stalk Sam through the hallway, grab her by her backpack, saw two boys push Sam at her when Sam tried to get away, and everyone saw Tory throw the first punch. Probably a lot of witnesses to the fact that Tory later pulled out a weapon and Sam didn't.
Demetri might be prosecuted for throwing Hawk head first into a glass trophy case but since Hawk barely had a scratch on him after, and was up and walking around fine a few minutes later, that might not stick.
And the parents will sue the school for being warned about this and doing absolutely nothing about it. The student who started the riot openly warned them before she did it, they had at least like, a half hour to an hour to call the cops and get Sam to safety. LBR, if Tory was black she would have been punished just for storming in and grabbing the mic, if she was autistic she'd be locked in a closet just for "displaying a threatening attitude". The security guard they were in the process of interviewing for a job when the riot broke out was not only unqualified but an adult member of Cobra Kai (Chubs/Stingray) who immediately started defending Cobras against Miyagi Do kids. Some of the teachers ran away!
To be fair, it's a public school in the 21c, so the teachers were probably drilled on what to do in the event of an active shooter but not how to stop a full scale karate riot. These kids don't need guns, they've been taught how to kill with their bare hands and there were like fifteen of them.
